


Have Yourself a Merry Little Ecks-Mas

by Vivien



Category: What We Do in the Shadows (TV)
Genre: Christmas, Gen, Ridiculous, Vampires
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-18
Updated: 2020-12-18
Packaged: 2021-03-10 20:42:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,146
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28143315
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Vivien/pseuds/Vivien
Summary: A Very Special What We Do in the Shadows Christmas Episode“You think you do your job, you raise your offspring right, teach them what you know. You set your little baby free to devour and destroy, as she will, and she flies off on her own. Or at least you think she does, but she does turn invisible now, so…”The camera zooms in as Nadja sighs.“And then out of the blue, your grown up baby shows up on your doorstep, and you have to be there for them again. Whether you’re in the mood or not. I definitely was not.”
Comments: 7
Kudos: 27
Collections: Yuletide 2020





	Have Yourself a Merry Little Ecks-Mas

**Author's Note:**

  * For [LilacAndGooseberry](https://archiveofourown.org/users/LilacAndGooseberry/gifts).



> I hope this brings a little ridiculous X-mas cheer!
> 
> Colin's fruitcake facts come from [this Mental Floss article](https://www.mentalfloss.com/article/60595/15-fun-facts-about-fruitcake) by Erika Wolf.
> 
> Thank you to Mneme for the super quick beta!

INTERVIEW FOOTAGE of NADJA

INT. Creepy Gallery - Right after midnight

“You think you do your job, you raise your offspring right, teach them what you know. You set your little baby free to devour and destroy, as she will, and she flies off on her own. Or at least you think she does, but she does turn invisible now, so…”

The camera zooms in as she sighs. 

“And then out of the blue, your grown-up baby shows up on your doorstep, and you have to be there for them again. Whether you’re in the mood or not. I definitely was not.”

DOCUMENTARY FOOTAGE of the foyer and front door.

INT. Foyer - Early evening

There is a frantic rapping at the front door. Guillermo, feather duster in one hand, clomps over to answer it, shaking his head in annoyance. 

“It gets tiring, you know?” He says over his shoulder to the camera crew. “Having to dispose of the corpses, keep things clean, answer the doors. It’s a busy time of year, even when you don’t celebrate any holidays.”

He opens the door and, to his dismay, there stands Jenna. Blood spatters deck the embroidered Christmas tree on her sweater, and she is crying, bloody tears leaving tracks down her face. 

“I need to see Nadja,” she chokes out, swiping her bright red sleeve over her face to mop up the excess fluid. “Is she here?” 

Guillermo tries to hide how one lip curls up upon sight of the girl who Nadja just freaking made a vampire on a whim without even once thinking about him and his decade of servitude, when all he wants, all he’s ever wanted, is to have what she was tossed so carelessly.

“I’ll have to check,” Guillermo lies, and starts closing the door.

“Wait, can-” Jenna sniffles. A red snot bubble dangles from her nose and Guillermo grimaces at the camera in disgust. 

“Can I please come in while you check? I’ve had a- a rough-” She covers her face and blood leaks between her fingers as she wails.

Guillermo heaves a sigh and opens the door again, letting Jenna in. 

DOCUMENTARY FOOTAGE of JENNA

INT. Parlor - Early evening

Jenna bawls messily, waiting for Nadja as she perches on an armchair. She’s now using the checked kitchen towel Guillermo brought her to mop the blood from her face. Her sleeves are soaking wet, darkening to brown instead of cheerful holiday red.

“Jenna,” Nadja says, sweeping into the room, and looking vaguely concerned but mostly annoyed. “What are you doing here?”

Jenna staggers to her feet, still crying, and collapses into Nadja’s arms, holding onto her tightly as she wails. Nadja stares at the camera, horror-stricken, her arms stuck awkwardly out, not embracing the girl back. 

She mouths to the camera crew, “What the fuck?”

INTERVIEW FOOTAGE of NADJA

INT. Creepy Gallery - Right after midnight

“I didn’t know they could do that. Come back once they’ve flown the nest. If I’d known that I might not have made her into a vampire. But it is what it is.”

DOCUMENTARY FOOTAGE of NADJA and JENNA

INT. Parlor - Early evening

The kitchen towel is drenched red, and Jenna’s tears have slowed to sniffles. Nadja stares at Jenna in horror and confusion. When she needs a break, she turns to stare at the camera crew in horror and confusion.

“I know I’m a powerful vampire now, and I shouldn’t- none of this should matter, but it’s such a special time of year, and we always did so much together.” The tears begin flowing again, and Nadja gapes at all the blood the younger vampire is losing. “And it’s my first year on my own, and I, you know, I just wanted to put up the tree with them and see all the sweet little ornaments we had stories about one more time. But then they invited me in, everyone was so happy, and they smelled so good, and I- I- I ate them. I ate my parents.” She dissolves into weeping.

INTERVIEW FOOTAGE of NADJA and LASZLO

INT. Creepy Gallery -Some time after midnight

“I ate my mother first thing,” Laszlo declares. 

Nadja does not look impressed as she gazes out at the camera. 

Laszlo points a finger towards the camera. “And it wasn’t a sex thing, either, which surprised me as much as it does you. Even though I hadn’t planned on it, had nothing against her - I loved my mother very much as a human - when she embraced her loving son, who’d come to the door after being missing for a couple of days, her neck was right there, and- well. It just happened. I understand young Jenna’s quandary. Mother was delicious, though. I can still recall her taste.” He looks off camera wistfully.

“I didn’t eat my parents,” Nadja announces. “They’d been dead a long time before I was made a vampire. But even had they been alive, I did what any self-respecting vampire does, and I got the fuck away from my village. They had treated me well, in life, and it was the least I could do to not eat them.”

“But the problem isn’t the patricide,” says Laszlo, focusing back on the matter at hand. “Now she wants to celebrate <i>that</i> special time of year here. With us.”

“We don’t celebrate Chr-” she chokes trying to pronounce the holy word. “We don’t do that. It’s the opposite of what we do. I can’t even say the word.”

“Ecks-Mas,” Laszlo declares. “That’s as good as we’re going to manage.”

"I see X-Mas used a lot," Nadja says, nodding.

"Oh, yes," Laszlo agrees. "Those lazy mortal fucks hate spelling out words when they can use one letter to stand for the whole thing."

DOCUMENTARY FOOTAGE of JENNA and NADJA

INT. Parlor - Early evening

Jenna's face lights up with a smile as Nadja, after several moments of hesitation, nods her head yes despite herself.

NADJA VOICEOVER: “But when your little baby vampire is crying blood all over the furniture, sometimes you find yourself promising things you never dreamed you’d offer.”

Jenna hugs Nadja, smiling hugely, and then gets up. She dabs the towel on a bloodstain on the cushion, makes an “I’m sorry” face and then smiles again as she scurries towards the door, running out into the night.

After a few moments, an extremely grumpy Guillermo crosses the room to close the freaking door.

INTERVIEW FOOTAGE of COLIN ROBERTSON

INT. Basement - Around 2:00 AM

“How am I feeling about celebrating Christmas here? 

DOCUMENTARY FOOTAGE of JENNA

INT. Parlor - Mid-evening

Jenna wears a new holiday sweater as she drags a red and a green storage tote through the front door as she hums “Jingle Bells”. She takes out a wreath and loops a wreath holder over the door, settling it there.

Nandor the Relentless walks into the parlor and stares at the wreath and then the camera crew. He points at the wreath and says,“What the fuck?”.

INTERVIEW FOOTAGE of COLIN: 

INT. Basement - Around 2:00 AM

“Oh, I’m great with it. Energy vampires aren’t bothered by the trappings of the holiday. In fact, Christmas is one of the best feeding times of the year. Everyone’s so distracted and busy, it’s easy to waylay them. Did you know that fruitcake dates back to at least Roman times? The Romans mixed pine nuts, barley mash, pomegranate seeds, raisins, and honeyed wine and shaped it into a cake they called “satura.” Fittingly, the word _satire_ —a literary device the Romans invented—is derived from the cake: a mix of many ingredients both sour and sweet -”

The camera tilts slightly to the side, and Colin grins, continuing to rattle off facts about fruitcake while he feeds.

  
  


INTERVIEW FOOTAGE of NANDOR:

INT. Parlor - Mid-evening

“I didn’t want to have anything to do with it. I didn’t celebrate eks-mass when I was living, much less now. All these years, I watched the holly and the ho ho hos and the children with their strange loud toys from afar, and that was the way it should be.”

The camera pans out, and it is evident that Nandor is wearing a Santa hat - with black fur trim instead of white, but still distinctly Kris Kringle-esque.

“And then, Jenna happened.”

He grins. “I thought it would be the worst thing that could happen to us, but it’s really not so bad.”

DOCUMENTARY FOOTAGE of NADJA 

INT. Parlor - Mid-evening

Nadja stands with her arms crossed, the look of baffled horror back in full effect as she watches Jenna pull baubles and ornaments out of the storage totes. Some of them burn her hand when she touches them. She drops these back into the totes, but there are plenty of secular candy canes and gingerbread men and snowflakes to haul out and babble about.

Nandor glimpses a basketball ornament in Jenna’s hand and mouths “ooooh” as he’s drawn to it like a magpie to something shiny. Jenna beams and hands it to him. He dangles it by his fingers, looking at the camera like this is the most amazing treat he’s ever seen.

INTERVIEW FOOTAGE of NADJA and LASZLO

INT. Creepy Gallery - Sometime after midnight

“She descended upon our inner sanctum like a suburban housewife in a fever dream,” says Laszlo, as Nadja holds up her hands and shrugs. 

“At first we were _extremely_ uncomfortable,” he continues. “All that cheery red and green… It was heinous. We had to make some adjustments.”

CAMERA CUTS TO GUILLERMO, who is in the dark backyard, spray painting a fake Christmas tree black. His mouth is pursed in annoyance, and he glares up at the camera without saying a thing.

DOCUMENTARY FOOTAGE of JENNA

Int. Dining Room Computer Desk - Late evening

Jenna sits in front of the computer, the screen of which is not visible to the viewer. The other three vampires stand behind her, at turns looking baffled, then delighted, then sickened, and so on. At one point, Nandor points to the screen, his mouth a perfect “o” and he claps his hands with glee, as Jenna looks up at him and nods yes.

INTERVIEW FOOTAGE of COLIN ROBINSON

INT. Basement - Around 2:00 AM

Colin’s eyes are still glowing. The angle of the camera attempts to straighten.

“It wasn’t until the 16th century that fruitcake really started to become a thing,” Colin drones on. “In his 2002 article ‘A Short History of Fruitcake’ for the _Village Voice_ , Robert Sietsema blamed ‘the fruitcake plague’ on inexpensive sugar that came to Europe from the colonies in the 1500s.”

The camera tilts once again.

DOCUMENTARY FOOTAGE of JENNA, NADJA, and NANDOR

INT. Parlor - Late evening

The black plastic tree stands tall in a corner, and there are garlands of black ribbons draping the walls. The ribbon is interspersed with bright notes of red and green. A jolly snowman statue with a black top hat gestures with a broom made of tiny straw from one of the side tables.

Jenna and Nadja decorate the tree with glittering ball ornaments of black and white. Nadja is hesitant, warily hooking the ornaments onto the branches. Jenna adds dangling snowmen and snowflakes and nutcrackers and ballerinas - anything that doesn’t burn her hands upon touch. Four stockings hang from the mantle. Nandor stands beside one, in New York Knicks team colors, beaming as he pats it.

INTERVIEW FOOTAGE of NANDOR

INT: Parlor - The following evening

“Look what Jenna ordered for me!” Beside Nandor on the end table is another small plastic tree filled with ornaments of the players from the USA Olympic Dream Team. Nandor gestures to it with both hands. “It’s my very first Ecks-Mas gift. Jenna even wrapped it in creepy paper.”

From off camera, Guillermo can be heard correcting his master - “Crepe paper.”

Nandor ignores him.

[ (https://www.etsy.com/listing/874766707/dream-team-usa-basketball-ornament) ](https://www.etsy.com/listing/874766707/dream-team-usa-basketball-ornament)

“Had I known they existed, we’d have celebrated Ecks-Mas a long time ago. Look at them, the Dream Team on a tree with blinky lights. It’s the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen.”

DOCUMENTARY FOOTAGE of GUILLERMO

INT: Parlor - Near midnight 

Guillermo stands by the Christmas tree, looking a little wistful. He pokes one of the candy cane ornaments and watches it sway from its black branch.

CAMERA PANS to JENNA, sitting on the sofa.

“They didn’t have to help me,” she says, “and I know it’s not traditional, or even accepted to, you know, celebrate a holiday like this. But it’s really and truly the most wonderful time of the year, even if all the religious symbols burn your flesh.”

INTERVIEW FOOTAGE of COLIN ROBINSON

INT: Basement - 2:00 AM

“In the spirit of the season, I think I’m going to teach my roomies 'The Twelve Days of Christmas - sorry, Ecks-Mas' - song. Then I’m going to make them sing it a few times in its entirety.”

Colin chuckles. ”God bless us, everyone.”


End file.
